Who is Included?

 Acts 8:26-39 

               Today we continue our journey through the book of Acts.  And we start by hearing a little about Philip.  Last week I shared with you that we learn in the early chapters of Acts that there was a Diaconate of 7 Greek leaders or disciples appointed to balance out the disciples from Jerusalem.  Like Steven, who we discussed last week, Philip is another one of these seven.  And at the beginning of chapter 8 we learn that while the early Christians were being persecuted, the unexpected result of this was that they were ending up spreading the word in much more expansive and effective ways.  They were being “scattered” as they escaped their persecution, which meant they were going out into other areas and telling the stories of Jesus and spreading the word. 

               So, then we come to today’s passage.  And we hear about this Eunuch.  The passage begins by telling us much about him.  He is Ethiopian, which was often a way of stating, at that time, that he was darker skinned.  He was probably a slave and we are told he was in charge of the entire treasury for the Queen of Ethiopia.  He is on his way “home to Jerusalem.”  And since many of the elite Jews during the Babylonian exile were exiled to Ethiopia, this tells us he is probably Jewish, but just like the Greek Jews who by many were not seen as the “real” chosen ones, because he is working in Ethiopia, he probably was not included, not “let in” to that inner circle by the Jerusalem Jews.  We are told all of this in a few brief sentences.  But after all of these ways of him being introduced, the story then identifies him only by his sexuality.  He is called “the Eunuch” for the rest of the story.  What is this about? 

               We will come back to that in a moment.  We are told, then, that he is reading this passage from the book of Isaiah.  And the passage says, “

Like a sheep he was led to the slaughter

    and like a lamb before its shearer is silent

    so he didn’t open his mouth.

In his humiliation justice was taken away from him.

    Who can tell the story of his descendants

        because his life was taken from the earth?

               This passage is from Isaiah 53: 7-8.  And it is probable that this Eunuch can relate to this passage all too well.  Eunuchs at this point in time were often young men, or older boys who were castrated against their will in the service of royalty.  They had no choice in it, and yet, after it happened, it was then usually held against them.  “in his humiliation, justice was taken away from him” must have resonated strongly with this Eunuch.  And according to Deuteronomy 23:1, then, “No one who has been emasculated by crushing or cutting may enter the assembly of the Lord.”  So this is a man who has been banned from the fellowship because of something related to his sexuality over which he had no actual choice.  Hm.  Sound familiar?

               This Eunuch, who is clearly still a very faithful person, is reading this passage in Isaiah and undoubtedly deeply resonating with the pain of it when Philip approaches.  But the Eunuch also has the wisdom, the insight, the foresight to have humility around it.  Or perhaps he is afraid that it is too good to be true that a Lord, a leader, could understand the kind of pain that he himself has lived.  He asks Philip to whom the passage refers.   And Philip talks about how this passage relates to Jesus.  He goes on to tell the eunuch all about Jesus.  And the Eunuch is so touched, so moved, so impressed with this Jesus who, like himself, was humiliated, rejected and whose life was taken away just as the Eunuch’s was, that he asks to be baptized right then and there.  But he does it in a way we would expect anyone who has received rejection after rejection after rejection to ask.  Instead of just saying, “Please baptize me now!”  he instead says, “What would prevent me from being baptized?”  and my guess is that he is asking it as a genuine question.  Will his sexuality prevent him from being baptized?  Will his being from Ethiopia and of darker skin keep him from being baptized?  Will his being a Jew who is not from Jerusalem prevent it?  Will his working for the royalty of Ethiopia keep him from being baptized?  He dares to ask.

               Just like with today’s people of faith, the questions around who was included and who was excluded were not clear cut.  There was argument.  There was debate.  I read to you the passage from Deuteronomy.  It was part of the purity code, which, by the way, included other things such as “It is an abomination to wear clothing of mixed material.”  And “It is not lawful to plant two types of crops in the same field.”  Men cutting their side burns, the eating of shellfish and pork – all of these were prohibited in this purity code.  But still, even in the Old Testament there were other voices arguing against this exclusion.  If the Eunuch had read just a little further in Isaiah, for example, he would have found one.  Isaiah 56: 3-4 reads, “Don’t let the immigrant who has joined with the Lord say, “The Lord will exclude me from the people.”  And don’t let the eunuch say, “I’m just a dry tree.”  The Lord says:  To the eunuchs who keep my sabbaths, choose what I desire, and remain loyal to my covenant.  In my temple and courts, I will give them a monument and a name better than sons and daughters.  I will give to them an enduring name that will not be removed.”

               And, of course, the answer that Philip gave, the answer that is always, always given by God, to the Eunuch, to all those who have been excluded and rejected, humiliated and shamed is “No!  Nothing will prevent you from being baptized this day in this water.”  That is the Christian answer.  That is the response of Jesus’ followers.  What has excluded you before will no longer exclude you now.  You are included in this place and in this time.  You are invited to be part of this community.  This is the Good News that Philip continues to spread and preach “in all the cities until he reached Caesarea.”

               But just in case this wasn’t clear, Jesus himself had something to say about this as well.  This is from Matthew 19:11-12: “Jesus replied, ‘Not everybody can accept this teaching, but only those who have received the ability to accept it.  For there are eunuchs who have been eunuchs from birth. And there are eunuchs who have been made eunuchs by other people. And there are eunuchs who have made themselves eunuchs because of the kingdom of heaven. Those who can accept it should accept it.’”  I want you to read that again, because it is very interesting.  What does it mean that there were eunuchs who had been so from birth?  It means that this has a fuller meaning than simply what we now understand to be “eunuch”.  “Eunuch” for Jesus and for those of his time included anyone who did not neatly fit into the two categories we have said are “male and female”.  So I want you to hear this once more.  Matthew 9:11-12: : “Jesus replied, ‘Not everybody can accept this teaching, but only those who have received the ability to accept it.  For there are eunuchs who have been eunuchs from birth. And there are eunuchs who have been made eunuchs by other people. And there are eunuchs who have made themselves eunuchs because of the kingdom of heaven. Those who can accept it should accept it.’”  You notice he never tells them “go and sin no more” and he never tries to “heal” this.  He accepts it as sometimes being for the kingdom of heaven.  

               Of course, there are other passages that also figure in here, such as Galatians 3:28: “There is neither Jew nor Greek; there is neither slave nor free; nor is there male and female, for you are all one in Christ Jesus.”

               And yet, despite the fact that even Jesus preached acceptance, inclusion and even a recognition that for the kingdom’s sake, some would choose a different sexual identity, we still struggle with this.  This remains the case for today.  We, too, know there are Christians who reject others for their sexuality: their orientation, their gender identity, whatever it is.  But that is not what this passage shows us.  Those who choose to come in, those who choose to be included in the faith ARE included. 

               Dale posted on FB this week a quote that I think is so apt, so appropriate, “Worry about your own sin.  God is not planning to ask you about mine.”  Or, as Connie Schultz said it, “My mom taught me that being a Christian meant fixing ourselves and helping others, not the other way around.”  But we get really confused by all of this, don’t we? 

               Martin Buber wrote that there are really only two possible ways we can relate to the world.  I-it, or I-Thou.  When you treat others as “its” it is very easy to judge them, to condemn them.  But “thou” recognizes the other as a person who you can understand through relationship, through connection.  You can’t stereotype “thou”s because you know each as an individual.  You can’t ignore them, you can’t own them, you can’t throw them away.  The God who gave us life IS love and we are called to love with God’s love.  As I recently heard someone say, “Everybody is God’s somebody.”  EVERYBODY is God’s somebody.  Bishop Michael Curry said, “The Lord didn’t create anybody to be under anybody else’s boot” (Love is the Way, p 177) and that is what Philip understood in this story.

               As I was thinking about the question, “who is out” and “who is in” I found myself remembering the very first time I had visited a particular boyfriend's parents for Christmas.  We were both well into adult-hood and we had been seeing each other for about a year at this point.  As we were setting the table to eat, my boyfriend's mother asked, “how many are here?”  One of the my boyfriend's siblings sister replied, “Well, there are seven.  There are five of us and two of them.”  But my boy-friend's step-dad quickly came back with “No!  There are six of us!  And one of them.”  Now I’m certain he doesn’t remember this.  But I was struck at the time by the ferocity by which he defended my boyfriend’s place as part of their family rather than part of mine.  I found myself also thinking, “At what point do we count ourselves as ‘us’ instead of ‘them’?  At what point does the ‘I-Thou” move even deeper into the “We”.

               In Tattoos of the Heart written by Father Gregory Boyle, he talks about his work with gangs in LA, giving them jobs, a sense of belonging to something and to people who do not require violence or aggression as part of their membership rituals.  He writes about his experiences with these boys, these men, these families.  But his book begins with these words, “If there is a fundamental challenge within these stories, it is simply to change our lurking suspicion that some lives matter less than other lives.  William Blake wrote, ‘We are put on earth for a little space that we might learn to bear the beams of love.’ Turns out this is what we all have in common, gang member and nongang member alike: we’re just trying to learn how to bear the beams of love.” (pxiii).

The idea of Ubuntu is that “a person becomes a person through other people” – we are deeply and completely connected to one another.  When I am injuring you, it is me, myself who is damaged in the process.  And when I am kind to you, I am offering that kindness to myself as well.  There is a community in South Africa where an anthropologist told this story after studying the habits and customs of a specific tribe there.  When he finished his work, he had to wait for transportation that would take him to the airport to return home. He’d always been surrounded by the children of the tribe, so to help pass the time before he left, he proposed a game for the children to play. He’d bought lots of candy and sweets in the city, so he put everything in a basket with a beautiful ribbon attached. He placed it under a solitary tree, and then he called the kids together. He drew a line on the ground and explained that they should wait behind the line for his signal. And that when he said “Go!” they should rush over to the basket, and the first to arrive there would win all the candies. When he said “Go!” they all unexpectedly held each other’s hands and ran off towards the tree as a group. Once there, they simply shared the candy with each other and happily ate it. The anthropologist was very surprised. He asked them why they had all gone together, especially if the first one to arrive at the tree could have won everything in the basket – all the sweets. A young girl simply replied: “How can one of us be happy if all the others are sad?”

               Returning to the situation experienced by the Eunuch, this situation continues, as we know, today.  A 2014 study showed that 70% of all millennials and 58% of Americans overall now believe that religious groups are alienating people by being too judgmental about LGBTQ+ issues.  One quarter of the people how were raised in faith and left those traditions say that negative treatment of LGBTQ+ folk was the primary reason for their leaving.  We, as a church, claim to be something more, we say we are inclusive.  But are we?  Do we talk to those who are different from ourselves?  Do we include and invite into conversation those we don’t understand?  In light of the shrinking church, many ask how we can possibly feel we can afford to be judgmental.   But I will own that I don’t feel that we should stay alive as a church just to stay alive. 

No.  I don’t call us to be inclusive out of fear of dying.  I call on us to be welcoming and inclusive because that is what we are called to do.  The church has to exist with meaning and purpose or it shouldn’t exist at all.  And our purpose is to love.  That’s the bottom line, every time.  Our purpose is to love.  It is not to judge.  It is not to exclude.  We are invited into learning, we are invited into our own growing.  And we are invited into loving.  It’s all that easy, and it’s all that hard.  Thanks be to God.  Amen.

Ducks!

         Yesterday we were given a very odd, but amazing gift.  I was working in our back yard, pulling weeds and Jonah came out to help me.  I asked him to please water the plants around the edges when suddenly I hear him yell.  I stopped what I was doing, ran to where he was and he pointed to...

                    

    In case it isn't clear, that is a picture of a mama mallard duck and she has ten little babies.  For those of you who might not know, our backyard is completely fenced in, there is no water area, and by non-Bay Area standards, it is actually quite a small yard (for here, it's pretty decent!).  I was astonished.  

    How did they get in?  How would they get out?  Where could they possibly go to find water near here? There is a creek about 3 blocks away... they could probably walk to it, but it is completely dried up.  There's no water in it.  

    But the first thing I did was open our gate.  Again, I couldn't figure out how they would possibly have gotten IN, but I had a suspicion that maybe the babies were actually born here, in which case, the mama could have flown in.  I had seen her and her mate in our yard once before, but had no idea they had taken up residence somewhere within it.  Was it possible the babies had actually been born under a bush here?  That was the only way I could fathom they had gotten in.  

    The second thing I did was that I called the wildlife hospital at Lindsay Museum.  But I had to leave a message.  (This was Sunday afternoon, after all).  In the meantime, I saw the mama duck basically pacing back and forth in the corner with her ducklings and I began to worry about them having water.  I took the bird-feeder bowl that we have on a pedestal (we made sort of a fountain out of it) and I put it on the ground near the corner where the mama duck was.  I refilled it with water and stepped back.  The mama immediately walked over and climbed into the bowl.

    Okay... but there was no way the ducklings would be able to climb into the bowl.  Hm.

    So, still waiting to hear back from Lindsay Museum, out of worry, I finally got out a cookie sheet, filled it with water and put it next to the bowl.  Within seconds the ducklings were all playing in the tiny bit of water:

    Both of those are under our big tree that has a bird feeder under it, and I noticed they were nibbling on some of the seed that had spilled out of the feeder.  So I took a scoop of birdfeed, put it on a plate and set it near the cookie sheet.  They immediately ate some of it.

    All this time I was talking to the mama duck.  She would tilt her head and look at me as if she was working to understand what I was saying.  She was not afraid of me at all, not even really cautious, which was both flattering and concerning.

    Finally, Lindsay called back.  The woman told me I needed to shoo them out of my yard.  They are wildlife and do not belong there.  I told her I was worried they would get hit by a car and that there was NO water source nearby.  She basically said "Too bad.  That is what you must do. It's not your responsibility if the mama duck is a bad mama."  Ugh.

    So we tried.  We told them they had to go and tried to encourage them to go out the gate by getting closer and closer to the ducks and trying to herd them in the proper direction.  This did not go so well...

    They basically sat down and were not moving.  Nope.  No way, no how.  

    I started to really worry about them.  Jonah read that it takes 5-8 weeks before the babies are ready to fly.  I did not think our yard, with its lack of a real water area, enclosed, was a really good place for the ducks to live.

    So I got on the phone again and started making other calls.  California Game and Wildlife isn't open Sundays or Mondays, but I left a message.  Contra Costa Animal Control also wasn't open but I left a message there too.  I asked around.  Someone suggested I catch them and take them to Heather Farms Park (about a 15 minute car -ride away) that has a couple big ponds with lots of ducks and geese.  But I had read (in my search) that it is illegal to catch and relocate wildlife, even from improper places.  

    I kept my eye on the ducks for most of the time, and they seemed to just be exploring the yard.  The mama walked them here, walked them there.  They followed her around, but none of them seemed particularly anxious.  Still, at one point I had to get up and go into the other room for a couple minutes.  When I got back, I could no longer see them in the yard.  We went out to see if we could figure out where they went, but couldn't find them anywhere.

    While I think it is extremely unlikely that they went out by the gate, which was quite a ways away from where the ducks had been hanging out, we could not find them, nor could we find any other possible exit.  No holes in the fences that we could see, no holes to under the house.  This remains the case.  I haven't seen them at all today.  

    They appeared unexpectedly.  They disappeared unexpectedly.

    And while I know that their journey is their own, and that our yard was not a good place for them, while I spent most of the time they were with us trying to figure out how to help them leave, I still found myself unexpectedly disappointed and sad at their leaving.      

    I found myself reflecting once more on the story Lost and Found by Oliver Jeffers, about a little boy's encounter with a penguin, his hard work to get the penguin back home and his final realization that the penguin wasn't lost at all, just lonely and wanting a friend.  The boy in the story only realized in the end that he, too, was lonely and needed the penguin as much as the penguin needed him.  

    That story became real for me over the last two days.  I spent the entire time of this amazing gift of a duck mama and her babies trying to help them move on, only to discover when they were gone how much their afternoon with us had touched me, had blessed me, had given me a gift I was very sad to see end.  I found myself wondering if we had been too mean, trying to chase them out of our yard, despite the instructions of the Lindsay Wildlife worker (and though we were unsuccessful at the time).  I worried they had felt unwelcome.  I worried I had missed the whole thing: spending it in being too concerned for the duck and her babies.

    But the thing is, this is how the Divine, God, Mystery, blessing, or (for the non-religious) serendipity shows up.  It can't be summoned, and it lasts an unpredictable amount of time.  We have no control over when it comes or when it goes.  Our call (and this is for our own sakes, as all of our calls ultimately and most deeply are!) is therefore, very simply, to keep paying attention so that we do not miss the blessing, the face of God, the gift of mystery when it shows up.  Our call is to be open to seeing it, because sometimes it comes in a flash and is gone just as quickly.  If we miss it, we can't get it back.  It is gone.

    Don't waste those amazing moments, those unexpected visions of life and mystery, those incredible and unanticipated wonders that sometimes come our way.

    I almost missed this gift.  I didn't appreciate the depth of it when it was mine to behold.  But the gift continues through the lesson.  So I step into a new day.  Eyes open.  Ears open.  For that next amazing wonder that comes my way.

The Controversies that Surround Us

 

                                                            Luke 23:33-34a, 46

Acts 6:1—7:2a, 44-60

            Today we continue with the narrative lectionary which moves into a study of the book of Acts, which is a book we usually do not spend a great deal of time on.  There are really important lessons in today’s reading, especially for our country and our culture at this very moment.

            At that time, there was a huge debate between Hebrew disciples and immigrant Greek-speaking disciples.  The Hebrew disciples had felt that they were the true disciples.  They were the ones who grew up in or near Jerusalem, they understood the laws, the practices, the rituals.  There was no room for these Greek-speaking immigrants into Jerusalem.  The Greek speaking followers recognized that their authority was not being honored, they were not being respected, they were not being treated as full human beings, let alone full members of the church of Jesus.  Their widows weren’t being cared for.  So they ordained another group of Greeks whose primary job was to care for the poor, etc., allowing the original disciples to focus on speaking and leadership, etc.  The resolution was finally reached to this conflict when seven of the Greek, immigrant leaders were chosen to be ordained into the diaconate.  As part of the diaconate, then, they would primary do the caring for the poor.  It was a resolution.  Or rather, people THOUGHT that a resolution had been reached.  After all, some parity had been officially stated between the two groups.

            But then we come to today’s reading. Stephen was one of those immigrant Greek-speaking disciples.  And he was not only good at caring for others, but he was wise, a good speaker.  He was doing amazing things as a leader of the people.  And he was falsely accused by the Hebrew speaking Jews from Jerusalem of betraying and denying Abraham, the laws, and in particular the centrality of the temple.  We don’t know why he was accused, but we can guess.  We can guess that it was because he was Greek, or because though he joined their ranks, he did not give up who he had been previously.  I want you to think about that.  He joined them, but he still remained himself, a Greek-speaking immigrant into the faith.  And he dared to do what some of the other leaders saw as their job alone. 

            We see this in the church.  White churches yearn for people of color to join them.  But they don’t want those who join to join as themselves.  They want them to CHANGE in order to join.  To speak the “right” language, both literally and metaphorically, to behave in the ways that we have decided are acceptable, are right, are appropriate.  We do this with children too.  Of course we want more children in the church!  But we expect them to behave according to the rules we have set up: no talking in church, dress appropriately, use the language we want you to use, even if you don’t understand it and it has no meaning for you.  We do this too.  And so we can understand their anger with Stephen.  They “welcome” him, but only in so much as they expect him to become like them rather than welcoming him truly as he was: a Greek-speaking immigrant to their community. 

            Well Stephen isn’t putting up with it.  So when he is hauled in front of the authorities, he has the audacity to speak truth.  He gives an entire history of the Jewish people, of God’s actions among them (this part is skipped in today’s reading) and then he ends with his own condemnation of the practices of the Hebrew or Aramaic speaking disciples – he says they are not following the laws!  And then he accuses them of crucifying Jesus.  They accuse him of not following Moses.  He accuses them of killing Jesus.

            Different sides, each accusing the other of destroying what matters most deeply to each side.  Attacking, accusing.  In today’s story that ended with Stephen’s death.  On January 6, 2021 that ended in five deaths.  These accusations, these attacks from both sides: when we cannot hear one another, when we cannot listen to one another, when we cannot tolerate truths that don’t agree with what we want to believe, people die.  We know, we understand that there are different versions of the truth.  And people feel so strongly over what is “true” that they are willing to kill, to fight with violent measures.  That was the case then and it is the case now.  Stephen is speaking truth but it is not what they want to believe so they kill him. 

            (as a side note, in Stephen’s case, his death in many ways also mirrored Jesus’ death: Jesus experience of being accused, killed and then from the cross asking forgiveness for those who were killing him.  Stephen did the same.) 

Much of this conflict between Stephen and the other Christians centered around the understanding of the temple.  It had been a source of conflict for a very long time: where is the correct place to worship?  Does it have to be in the temple in Jerusalem?  Many Jews at the time believed so.  The Samaritans were another group with the same beliefs, the exception being they believed God could be worshiped in other sanctuaries.  Jesus’ answer to them all?  “You Woman, believe Me, the hour is coming when you will neither on this mountain, nor in Jerusalem, worship the Father. …But the hour is coming, and now is, when the true worshipers will worship…  in spirit and truth…. God is Spirit, and those who worship Him must worship in spirit and truth.” (John 4:22-26)

We know that during this Covid time, that debate has come back.  Is it necessary to worship God in a building?  Or is God really and truly bigger than that and so can be worshiped and loved and served wherever we are?  There are all of these rules about being back in a building to worship.  But the worship of God happens in spirit and truth.  It’s interesting that this argument keeps coming back when the truth was that the early Christian church, for the first few centuries, only met in people’s homes.  They did not meet in cathedrals or special synagogue buildings at all until Constantinople.  To this day, the Seder, the Passover meal, the meal that we celebrate as the Lord’s Supper was always done in homes, in people’s houses.  But we have made it a “special building” thing and in doing so, we’ve lost so much of the original meaning – of connection with family, with intimacy in sharing that sacred meal of remembering.

As always, the good news is that conflict is an opportunity to change.  It is a gift if we use it as such.  It is an opportunity to be intentional as move forward, to be intentional about how we listen, how we respond when we don’t like or don’t want what we are hearing. All of these arguing people were only willing to look outward, to attack the other, to blame the other.  They covered their ears and did not want to hear what they did not want to hear.  None of them were willing to look at themselves, to look inward.  And none of them were also looking at the resurrection.  None of them were using the gift of imagination and vision that God gives to all of us to see where the new life was being born this time. 

But again, conflict is an opportunity for change.  Do you know why Latin is considered a dead language?  It’s not that it’s not used.  It is used.  We use it in music, we still use it in some religious liturgy.  We use it in scientific names.  The reason it’s considered dead is NOT that it is no longer used.  It’s dead because it isn’t CHANGING.  And in that is great wisdom.  Conflict is an invitation to imagine differently, to envision differently, to do things differently!

I’ve been reading a number of books recently.  One called Women Peacemakers by Barbe Chambliss, a friend of Ruth’s.  Another called Jan’s Story, that my father passed on to me.  A third called Love is the Way, by Bishop Michael Curry.  What is interesting is that in all of them there is at least one section that is talking about hope, and about the possibilities inherent in crisis.  They also, though, point out that the realization of those possibilities and that hope: that these are dependent on a choice to step forward into the new life that is being offered.  It is a choice.  Do we choose to get bogged down by the traumas and crises of our lives?  Or do we take the invitations inherent in each scenario, and do we use the gift of imagination that God has given us to us to see the possibilities inherent in the crisis, the trauma.  One of the women in the book Ruth lent to me, Connie Ning, gives microcredit, and microloans to women in Vietnam and Guatemala.  These loans are allowing women to begin many things: to start their own businesses, to finance their children’s education, to send girls back into their communities with new ideas, new visions, and new strength.  Connie Ning’s program is funding all of this.  But because it is empowering the girls and women to develop their own programs, it is exponential in its impact on not just individuals but communities as well.

I want to end by sharing with you a story that Lyle, once again passed on to me.  Apparently, there was at one point in Russia a professor who spent an hour lecturing his community on how religion was all ridiculous superstition.  He was very verbose, very articulate and at the end of his hour, his students were all nodding their heads and even applauded in agreement.  At the end of the hour he called up on old Russian Orthodox priest and told him he could give a ten minute rebuttal.  The old priest stood up and simply said, “Christos Anesti!” which means Christ has risen.  I’m certain you know what came next.  We’ll try it here in English.  When I say here loudly and with joy, “Christ has risen”  what happens here?  Well, let’s try it out.  “Christ has risen!”  yes.  He is risen indeed.  And even after this hour long lecture, when the priest stood up and said simply, “Christos anesti!”  The students all said with resounding shouts of joy, “Alithos anesti!”  He is Risen, INDEED.  No matter what our minds say, our hearts experience God, and our hearts remember the experience of God.  All the arguments, all the conflicts, all the debates, all the differences in the world cannot remove that experience of the risen Christ. 

Conflict, crisis, different view points, different visions, different understandings: these are invitations and opportunities to see God anew.  But we have a choice.  Do we take the launching points of crisis mixed with God’s gift of imagination to look, to see, to learn, to hear, to begin anew?  That is the invitation.  To see where Christ is risen.  To live the new possibilities God is given us. 

Christ is Risen! He is Risen, Indeed!

Judgments are so easy

        I participated in a small 24-hour clergy spiritual retreat over the last day (through zoom).  The woman leading the retreat was talking this morning about judgment.  Her point was that judgment is easy, but that it is not where we will find God.  She began by asking us to look at her as she described herself as a cis-woman, white, heterosexual, upper middle-class,  never divorced, never poor, never dealt with law enforcement in a negative way, never been in trouble legally, a dog-owner, mother, pastor of the same church for 18 years ... you get the idea.  She was telling us that because of her location and situation, there were many things that she could never claim to truly understand, but that she has a call, as we all do, to be open and compassionate towards ourselves and especially towards others who have different life experiences.  

    What was interesting for me is that I was having a hard time not judging her.  I felt that she was bragging about the facts, for example, that she had never been poor, never had a negative encounter with the law, and never been divorced.  And I kept thinking of a line from the movie Leap of Faith in which the main character said, "Would you want a virgin priest telling you how to fix your marriage?  No!  Would you want some teetotaler who had never had a problem with the bottle telling you how to give up your addictions? NO!"  And I kept thinking, how could I ever trust a person who had never struggled and who assumed they had their blessings because they'd earned them to be able to support me when I had struggled through hard and difficult times.  And then I felt angry.  There is such a strong inclination in all of us to assume that we have the good things that we have because we have earned them, because we have done something to obtain those blessings.  From that place of assuming our good things are because we deserve them, it is not a big leap to assuming that others are lacking those same good things because they don't deserve them.  We forget all the help, all the things we've been given since birth (since before birth, actually) that put us where we are and strongly affect where we can go with our lives, what paths our lives follow and what resources we have at any one time.  We forget this and it becomes very, very easy to judge others' situations.  And so I found myself really put off by this woman doing what I felt was boasting in order to teach we-who-have-suffered how to not judge others, and how to re-center and re-claim our lives in a healthier way.  

    But I quickly realized that, as she was talking about not judging, that I was judging her, this woman I really didn't know.  I realized that I had just assumed a whole host of feelings and emotions (hearing "bragging" behind her words, which may or may not have actually been there), as well as a whole life situation (that she had never really suffered, for example).  And I remembered, as I prayed and meditated, listening for God's words for me this morning, that our call whenever we are judging is to look deeper into ourselves.  So I dove into my own feelings to look at why I was making these assumptions about her.  And I realized that these thoughts and feelings I was assigning to this woman were feelings that I had, at one time, held myself.  I admit, with great shame, that there was a point in time when I, too, judged people who had been divorced, feeling that somehow I "did relationships" better.  There was a time, too, when I had assumed that people who struggled financially probably just weren't as intelligent and didn't have as much common sense and that this was at least a part of their poverty.  There was a time in my own life when I judged people who bought fast food for their children as unintelligent, uncaring, or even lazy parents.  I prided myself on my UC Berkeley education, on my doctorate, on my ability to save money, not go into debt, and own a house without depending on others for help.  I prided myself on buying only organic foods for my children, leaving the television off in favor of playing with the kids outside and reading books.  The kids had lessons: music, dance, and I thought there was no other way to raise them.  I felt good about my choices to work hard to take care of the environment, not using resources that I knew were damaging to the larger world, even if that meant buying more expensive items, bringing my own bags everywhere, not using "one-use" items, while still being generous to my community and to others.  I thought people who didn't make these choices were lacking in genuine compassion for the world, for others.  They were cold hearted and greedy, in my opinion, and their vision was very short-sighted.

    And then my own world had fallen apart.  I had to deal with abusive law officers, and a business-legal system that is mercenary and is not really about justice.  I became a divorced parent with sole custody of my three young children, working two jobs in order to support my kids, running through the McDonald's drive through at times because there just wasn't time to make dinner, there wasn't energy to get to the organic store; buying the cheapest foods, not the healthiest foods, because I had to stretch my lone salary to feed my family, sometimes using the "electronic babysitter" television for the kids when I just needed a nap and had been worn to the limit by my responsibilities, my jobs, and the deep grief of loss. The lessons I had insisted they take were mostly cut because I had neither the resources nor the ability to get them to those lessons or to make sure they practiced; and I even had to rely on financial help from extended family to be able to relocate and start again back home in the ultra-expensive Bay Area.  All of this forced me to reevaluate so many of my judgments, so many of my assumptions, so much of my mistaken "pride".  I got it now that sometimes divorce is the necessary choice for so many reasons.  Sometimes it's the brave choice, sometimes it's the most loving choice for our children.  This doesn't mean we chose badly in the first place and it doesn't mean we weren't deeply committed when we got married, or that we hadn't worked hard on our marriage.  Things change, situations change and sometimes our choices and decisions must change accordingly.  I got it now that sometimes people just do what they have to do to survive and that this doesn't always include an ability to buy more expensive but healthier foods, or consistent home-prepared meals.  I understood now that the pressures of one's life sometimes mean that we make less than ideal choices for our kids, including things like screen time instead of reading and playing with them outside all the time, or being able to buy them and take them to further education opportunities in the form of lessons.  I got it that life happens to people.  And the best we can do may not look the same as it does for people with more or different resources, but it is still the best we can do and we should celebrate and honor that rather than judging it. 

    I have often said that one of the challenges, but also one of the very deepest gifts of my life is that whatever I judge, I later am called on to face in my own life.  And that time of terrible hardship taught me so much, not only about myself, but also about other people who have not had easy lives.  

    I thought about all of this as I sat there in judgment of this person I did not know.  And I realized, once again, that if I chose to pay attention, to be "curious" about my own judgments (rather than heaping more judgment into the situation by judging myself for my judgments) that those feelings and assumptions had much to teach me, once again.  They called me to remember, to look deeper, and to let go.  They called me once again to release any shame I felt both for the judgments I had previously made, but also for the choices I later had to make to survive, to help my kids, and to walk through each day of that nightmare time.  

    I am grateful for all the challenges I have dealt with in my life because I do think each one of those hardships has given me more compassion, understanding and grace towards others who are struggling.  But I can also strive for compassion towards those who have not had these same experiences.  Until they have walked in the shoes of deep struggle, they may not see in the same way.  That is not their fault, that is simply the reality of the deep gifts of struggle.  

    It is so easy to judge.  But those judgments are voices calling us to look deeper at our own lives, to have compassion for ourselves as well as others, and to choose grace instead.  Be curious.  Look deep.  Let go of judgment.  Choose compassion instead.

Humor Sunday - Does God Have the Last Laugh?

 

Luke 24:13-35

               Some jokes to start us off:

Funny signs: in a shoe repair store: We will heel you. We will save your sole. We will even dye for you.

In a Podiatrist's office: Time wounds all heels. 

On a Septic Tank Truck: Yesterday's Meals on Wheels

At an Optometrist's Office: If you don't see what you're looking for, You've come to the right place.

On a Plumber's truck: We repair what your husband fixed. 

On another Plumber's truck: Don't sleep with a drip. Call your plumber.

At a Tire Shop in Milwaukee: Invite us to your next blowout.

On an Electrician's truck: Let us remove your shorts.

In a Non-smoking Area: If we see smoke, we will assume you are on fire and will take appropriate action.

At a Car Dealership: The best way to get back on your feet - miss a car payment.

Outside a Muffler Shop: No appointment necessary. We hear you coming.

In a Veterinarian's waiting room: Be back in 5 minutes. Sit! Stay!

At the Electric Company: We would be delighted if you send in your payment on time. However, if you don't, YOU will be de-lighted.

In a Restaurant window: Don't stand there and be hungry; come on in and get fed up.

In the front yard of a Funeral Home: Drive carefully. We'll wait.

In a Chicago Radiator Shop: Best place in town to take a leak.

 

As I’ve shared with you before, Christine Longhurst wrote, “Laughter Sunday (also known as Holy Humour Sunday, Hilarity Sunday, God’s Laughter Sunday, Bright Sunday or Holy Fools Sunday) has its roots in a number of different Christian traditions.  Churches in 15th century Bavaria used to celebrate the Sunday after Easter as Risus Paschalis (‘God’s Joke,’ or ‘the Easter laugh’). Priests would deliberately include amusing stories and jokes in their sermons in an attempt to make the faithful laugh. After the service, people would gather together to play practical jokes on one another and tell funny stories. It was their way of celebrating the resurrection of Christ – the supreme joke God played on Satan by raising Jesus from the dead.  However, the observance of Risus Paschalis was officially outlawed by Pope Clement X in the 17th century. Perhaps people were having too much fun.  In 1988, the Fellowship of Merry Christians began encouraging churches to resurrect some of these Christian traditions—to celebrate the grace and mercy of God through the gift of laughter and joy.  G.K. Chesterton once wrote: “Angels can fly because they take themselves lightly. Never forget that the devil fell by force of gravity. He who has the faith has the fun.”

               So that is the background of Humor Sunday.  While the psalms we read encourage joy, and laughter is a good way to get there, it is more than that.  There is also humor in the Bible.  Some of the stories are joyful, but others are downright funny.  Professor Hershey Friedman says that the different types of humor we find in scripture include, sarcasm, irony, wordplay, humorous names, humorous imagery, and humorous situations.  An example of humorous names: Caleb, one of the 12 spies sent by Moses into Canaan, means “dog”.  Ichabod, the grandson of Eli, means “no glory”.  When the Israelites were fleeing Egypt, they used sarcasm in confronting Moses by saying, “was there a lack of graves in Egypt that you took us away to die in the wilderness?”  An example of humorous imagery: In Samuel, Achish said to David, “Why did you bring him to me? Do I lack lunatics that you have brought this one to carry on insanely in my presence?"  Jesus says, “"You are like a person who picks a fly out of his drink and then swallows a camel".  Additionally, God names Isaac “laughter” – the one who leads us forward, who is our ancestor in faith is named “laughter”. 

               Laughter is a gift from God in so many ways.  Research shows that laughing actually has pain-reducing capacities, and it raises our pain threshold so we can tolerate pain better and we experience it less when we are laughing and for some time after a full, strong laugh.  It helps us learn – we learn better after a good laugh.  And it boosts our immune-enhancing capacities.  When we laugh fully and completely, we are said to “lose” it.  What we actually “lose” in those moments is our distraction of everything else – our distraction of our self-consciousness, our distractions of the stresses in our lives, we stop fleeing our stressing out and instead are completely present in the moment – and that moment, the NOW is where God is. 

               Laughter is often a sign of health, a sign of healing, a sign of resurrection.  When a congregation is struggling, you can often tell the level of conflict in that congregation by whether or not people can laugh together.  If they can’t, you know the conflict is very serious.  If they can, it either is not so bad, or the congregation is on the way to healing.  It is a sign of hope, a sign of life, and a sign of resurrection.

I love that God surprises us still, catches us still, in unexpected moments, with laughter.  That it is the kind of gift that can surprise and sneak up on you, and remind you to not take things so very seriously.  I want to tell you a story about Palm Sunday.  I only had three little parts, but the first part, the most serious part I led was the opening prayer.  As you know, we did Palm Sunday through zoom.  So I was at home, sitting on my couch with my laptop computer on my lap.  I began the prayer, and the cat jumped up on the couch next to me to try to climb onto the computer on my lap.  David was right there and he grabbed hold of her to put her on his lap, but as I continued to speak, the cat became more and more determined to sit on my lap, and on the computer, during the prayer.  About half-way through the prayer as I watched David struggling to keep this incredibly determined cat off my lap, I suddenly was hit with a fit of the giggles.  Of course, we are taught from a very early age, that giggling during prayers is not appropriate.  So, I was trying my hardest, as I continued the prayer, to stifle my giggle.  But as often happens when we get giggly at inappropriate times, the attempts to control it often make it worse.  I actually ended the prayer early because I knew I couldn’t hold the laughter in any longer. 

But as I thought about it afterwards, I felt that God had intervened for me that day.  God had reminded me not only to not take myself and my leadership so seriously, but that also, God is the God of joy and laughter.  When we are so serious all the time, we miss the gifts right in front of us.  We are called to praise God every day.  To rejoice in God everyday.  Sunday is not more holy.  And that hour of worship should not necessarily be more serious.  When we take ourselves too seriously, when we forget our own humanity and fail to be humble, God will find a way to remind us, even if it is just through an attack of the giggles.

I remember reading a story about a pastor who had a small interaction with a parishioner right before service.  He forgot that his mic was turned on and as he walked away he said something inappropriate in the mic about the parishioner.  He then went into the bathroom, and all heard his business through the mic.  He could have recovered from this, he could have, if he had had the humility to laugh at himself.  We all make mistakes, all of us do.  And when we can own them and laugh at them, usually others can forgive us and laugh with us too.  Unfortunately this particular pastor was so embarrassed that he chose to resign instead.  What a sad commentary on our inability to laugh.

Today we hear the story of the road to Emmaus.  And it starts in tragedy, in sorrow.  People had hoped for Jesus to be the one to redeem Israel: to save Israel from the Roman oppression.  Not only did he not do that, but he was killed in a most horrible manner.  The hopes of the people were dashed.  Additionally, they heard strange rumors that he was resurrected, but they hadn’t seen him.  They were confused, devastated, didn’t know what to believe.  They were upset, they were devastated, they were “downcast.”  But then they learn that Jesus has been resurrected.  They experience him, they see him, they break bread with him.  Do you not think they laughed with joy when they recognized Christ in their midst?  Do you not think that they broke into peels of delighted laughter when they realized how blind and unseeing they had been?  I can’t imagine it happening any other way!

But then one has to ask.  Did that mean that hope had returned for them?  Joy has returned for them.  But Jesus still was not what they had wanted.  He still didn’t overturn the oppression of the Romans.  He still was not a military leader who will take back what belongs to the people.  He still was not “in your face” with those who were harming the people.  He came, and he disappeared.  He showed up, but he didn’t stick around.  No, instead he called the disciples to continue his work, to be the voice of hope and love and grace for the community.  But he still did not take away free will, change their world in the way that they wanted or hoped.  And so, I ask the question, Does God have the last laugh?

Yes.  God laughs at our ideas of what a “king” should be.  God laughs at our ideas of what God should be.  God laughs at death.  God laughs at fear.  God laughs at every expectation that is out there.

But that’s not to say that God’s laughter is unkind.  God laughs because we don’t understand.  Our vision is too small, our understanding is too limited.  Our wants and even our hopes are just too small.  And so God laughs.  But it is the laughter of a parent who sees a newborn child delight at peek-a-boo as they learn “object permanence” and that a disappearing parent still exists, still returns, still loves them.  It is the laughter of a parent when the child laughs at paper being torn to shreds: I sent all of you that wonderful YouTube video of the baby laughing hysterically at paper ripping.  And the parent was laughing too.  All of us were laughing – you can’t help it.  The baby’s delight and laughter are so infectious that you can’t help but laugh along with him.  It is the laughter of a person when a chimpanzee sees a magic trick and cracks up because they don’t understand how the quarter could have disappeared. 

We are invited to laugh too: to not take ourselves so very seriously that we can’t enjoy this precious, wondrous, amazing life that God has given to us.  We are invited to let go of our expectations of ourselves that life will go a certain way, that we will do everything right, that things will be smooth or easy.  We are invited to let go of the idea that we have to “know” everything and instead to delight at our own lack of knowing, at our own surprise at the way life happens, at our own attempts to do everything right, knowing that we won’t get it right, but that grace is there for us even so.  We are invited to LAUGH.

And this takes us back to the story of the road to Emmaus.  You notice, they did not recognize him on the road.  He was only recognized after they invited him to come and eat with them.  Once again we see that God, that Jesus, that Christ never forces himself or God-self on any of us.  Jesus was present, but he was only known to the disciples when the disciples CHOSE to invite him in.  We have choice.  We have agency.  Do we allow God and God’s presence and God’s gifts into our lives?  Do we allow the gifts of laughter into our hearts, and the joy that follows into our lives?  It is a choice we can make.

As I wrote this, I found myself reflecting on when my kids were very young.  At one point we met another young mother who was anti-silliness.  She felt it was undignified and stifled anything that bordered on laughter in herself and especially in her young child.  And I found myself thinking, often, what an incredible tragedy that was that she rejected this life-giving, joy-giving, healing gift of God.

In our home we laugh a lot.  There is a great deal of silliness in our house, enough so that my kids sometimes wonder if other parents could ever be as silly as I am.  We have faces we make that our unique to our family, we have silly things we do with our voices and with specific songs.  We play.  My greatest memories are the times of laughter with my kids.  I wish that for you as well.  Not jokes, necessarily: but just pure, sheer silliness.  You’ve seen symptoms of that for those of you who’ve been to our home: googly eyes on the fridge, a toy that sits on my desk that is a laughing stuffed “pill”, my choosing one Humor Sunday to dress as a Leprachaun, etc. 

Anne Lamott said it this way:  “Laughter is carbonated holiness”.  Laughter is carbonated holiness!

One of my favorite images is of a laughing Jesus.  I love that image because it reminds us that part of what it is to be human is laughter.  Laughter is a gift from God.  Not something to be avoided when it comes to religion.  We are often nervous putting laughter and religion together.  But they should go hand in hand.  After all, who created laughter?  How gave us this wonderful gift of humor that calls us to not take ourselves or anything so very seriously? 

And to end with some more jokes:

For Lent, I gave up fast food, pizza, ice cream, and ...obviously... not lying.

A priest ,a rabbit and a minister walk into a bar.  The bartender asks the rabbit, “What will you have?”  The rabbit shakes his head and answers, “I have no idea, the only reason that I am here is because of Autocorrect.”

 

 

Resurrection Then and Now

 Luke 24: 1-12

               Happy Easter!  And it is a happy day!  For the first time in a year some folk will be coming back into the sanctuary today to celebrate Easter, the day of resurrection, the day of new life.  Others will be at home, waiting for it to be safer, waiting a little longer but still celebrating this glorious day with us!  Some came in for the Easter sunrise service, worshiping outside at the break of dawn as the sun peeked over the horizon and day came.  It is a day of new beginnings.  And it is a day when the life that we knew resurrects in this place.

               And yet, as you look around, you know that it is different.  So many of us are still at home.  The choir is not here singing with us for the in-person service.  And we will have no singing in the in-person service at all!  Those who sang for the pre-recorded service were fewer.  People are still wearing their masks.  Some of us have not been able to get vaccinated yet, and a few are choosing not to.  We are divided: some watching from home, some in person.  Our coffee hour is still mostly through Zoom.  People are not hugging, not even shaking hands.  Things remain different.  Things are not what they were.  The glorious entry back has not come to pass in the way we might have envisioned it a year ago!    Things are different.  And we may be wondering if they will ever “return to normal”. 

               But the truth is that there is no “normal”.  As we’ve talked about many times before, the only thing we can absolutely count on is change.  And while we may hope that change comes more slowly than it certainly has this year, that is often not how life presents.  Change is inevitable.  And all we have is to decide what we will do with the time that we are given.

               But today on Easter, I find, just as I found last year, that there is more similarity in our strange Easter with that first Easter than most Easters we have celebrated together.  For while we love to celebrate easter with trumpet and singing and large groups of gatherings, with eating and praise and beautiful clothing and decorations, we are reminded by today’s scripture readings that this is not what happened that first Easter.  A group had come to the tomb.  But it was not a joyful, loud, big group.  Instead, it was a group of a few, very sad, very disappointed, very scared, but faithful women who came to the tomb.  They were told by “two men in clothes that gleamed like lighting” that Jesus had risen.  But this did not lead to praise and singing.  This did not lead to great celebration and gathering and feasting.  No.  They heard the news, and then they ran away and told the disciples.  And this, too, then, did not spur or inspire the disciples to gather in a large joyous crowd either.  They, too, did not respond by gathering their families for worship, or gathering their families for a celebration feast or Easter Egg Hunt.  They did not begin to praise God, or preach the word, or celebrate Eucharist (thanksgiving).  They did not sing.  Instead we are told, “they did not believe the women because their words seemed like nonsense.  Peter even left them.  He went back to the tomb by himself, saw the strips of linen lying by themselves, and, we are told, he ”went away, wondering to himself what had happened.”  This is the original Easter: chaos, confusion, separation.  Questions, hiding, running.  Distance, retreat, disappointment, disbelief.  This is the original Easter.  This is the day we celebrate: a day of not knowing, a day of not understanding, a day of disbelief and retreat. 

               And so perhaps it is deeply appropriate that we, too, as we gather in our separate places and yet our together places, that we, too, are separate, are not knowing what tomorrow or next week or next year will look like, that we spend a day in having our set ideas of what Easter is, and what Church is, and what WE are supposed to be on this day: that we have all of this broken open. 

               In the transitional ministry class that I’ve been taking, it has been reinforced for me once again that because people so fear real, true, deep change, the only thing that pushes us to truly grow, truly deepen in our faith, in our communities, and in our work for God is some kind of “catalytic event”.  That the only thing that really moves us to be better, be stronger, be more faithful, deeper, more loving and connected to God and each other is chaos, is change, is crisis.  So, I would like to invite you to consider that this time is an opportunity.  And that this new stepping back in a different way, in a non-usual way, in a slightly chaotic and definitely different way is a GIFT to us.  It is a gift of being able to remember and reconsider what is important to us about church, what is the meaning for us in our faith, what is the true and deep and beautiful message of Easter.

               I shared this story on Good Friday, but I want to share it here again because I think it is so relevant and important:  When St. Paul’s Cathedral in London was being built, the architect was walking among the stonecutters.  He wanted to know how people were feeling about what they were doing.  So he asked one of the cutters, “What are you doing?”  And the cutter answered, “I’m hammering this stupid rock!”  Wren moved onto ask a second cutter, “What are you doing?”  This one answered, “I’m shaping this rock to be a cornice over a doorway.”  Finally he asked a third, “What are you doing?”  To which this stonecutter instantly replied, “I’m building a cathedral!” 

               Do we focus on the fact that it may feel like hard work to rebuild our congregation and our community?  Do we focus on the need to make everything the same ASAP so that we can “go back to normal”?  Or do we take this opportunity to really look at the amazing gift of resurrection.  Jesus was not resurrected in the way we expected.  And in fact, he was not resurrected the same.  We hear that Philip put his hands in Jesus’ side. His body was not the same.  He was resurrected with his scars.  And as we resurrect as a church, our body will not be the same either: some have moved away, for example.  And others have joined us: we had six new members join and I’ve been contacted by others who have been “participating” in our church whom we’ve never met. 

Jesus’ interaction with the disciples and his community was also different.  We read in scripture that the disciples didn’t recognize him on the walk to Emmaus.  We also hear, “When he was at the table with them, he took bread, gave thanks, broke it and began to give it to them.  Then their eyes were opened and they recognized him, and he disappeared from their sight.”  He came and went in a very different way and he was not the same person going around healing and teaching.  He spoke to few, and he inspired those few to be the risen Christ in the world: to go into the  world teaching and healing as he had done.  So, too, our church community will not be the same, will not look the same.  We will continue to do some teaching through zoom so that those who cannot come in and do not live close can continue to be part of us.  We will continue to offer multiple ways of seeing services: in person or from home.  Resurrection looks different than what we were before. 

But we have a choice.  We can see the hard work of the stone-cutter, or we can see the new church that we are building with wonder and with awe.  We can grieve what has changed, and indeed that is part of moving through and into something new.  But we can choose to become stuck there, and stuck in a process of trying to recreate exactly what was, or we can rejoice at the changes, and look for the ways in which God is re-creating us, re-inviting us into new life, new vision, new hope, a new church community. 

The good news of the resurrection is for each and every one of us.  We, too, get to be resurrected anew.  We are invited to start this day and every day with hope, with joy, with new vision into what could be, what might be, and to see into what WILL be. 

I want to share a little story that Rev. Michael Piazza wrote about and which Lyle shared with me about the amazing creative, life-giving work of God.  Rev. Michael Piazza wrote this: “Slaves would cook huge meals for the masters’ families, while they often were forced to make do with the leftovers. One staple often left to the slaves was what my mother used to call "pot liquor." Now, for those of you who didn't grow up poor, pot liquor is the liquid left after the food has been cooked.  My grandmother used to boil collards or turnip greens. When they were done, she would remove them and then drop globs of dough into the still boiling water to make dumplings. That often was all the slaves had to eat.  It wasn't until about 100 years later that nutritionists discovered [that] almost all the nutritional value of the food was left in the pot liquor. The slave owners would stuff themselves on the best life had to offer, but the slaves were the ones who were made stronger and healthier by the pot liquor.  Perhaps that is how it is with pain. The good times may make your life feel full, but the struggles can make you healthy and strong. You must decide which it will be; perhaps, though, there is not as much to fear from pain as you once thought.”

               And so, we learn that when we go through the pain of our crises, of our challenges, of the struggles, that when we can forgive, and when we can go through the work of dealing with the losses and the grief, when we can breathe into each day, we can emerge on the other side resurrected.  We will not look the same.  But those scars we carry are usually places of greater strength.  When the broken bones heal, the places they heal are stronger.  When we have scars, that scar tissue is tougher.  It does not look the same, but in it is life; new life, God-given life, resurrected life.

               This is the day we remember that Jesus has risen!  Not in the ways expected or even hoped for: but in the ways God has caused new life to be: fuller, deeper, spread out among and through and beyond the disciples and the community.  And we are a part of that resurrection, too.  Thanks be to God!  Amen.